Founder of Startup Weekend and Startup Enthusiast Based in Boulder, Colorado

Thoughts On Ignite Boulder 10

We celebrated our tenth event as (now) the largest Ignite in the world and certainty some amazing energy. I’ve done these types of posts for every event, this one is the toughest. Why?

Because we plateaued. Ignite 10 was equally as great at 8 (the last one at the large venue). This is all in my humble opinion, there are many people that have told me that this was their favorite.

What was awesome:

Sell Out at 875

Great speakers really went out of their comfort zone

Great pre and post parties were fantastic

Great band

Donated over $2000 to some great charities

Had a great night

The organizers are a top notch team, couldn’t ask for better people or progress. Really, each and every one of them is steller and I can’t thank them enough.

Seriously, the team behind planning Ignite gets it done

The bad:

Feels as if speakers can’t be alright, take a chance or go in with anything less than a Tony Robbins like charisma. We have has some amazing nights, and speakers have to live up to that, good or bad. If a speaker, one that has never spoken to a group over their high school english class, gets up and faces almost 900 people in a format that many professional speakers shy away from, I say awesome. Some attendees jump on them a bit, which is too bad.

Some of the talks lacked a point. Not a huge deal if you can read into what they are saying, why they are saying it and develop your own insights, but if you are looking to be fed a take home line you missed a ton.

Seems like our community has shifted a bit from our original core, feels like I can’t get a warm welcome from some of the new crowd. We are a ‘faceless event that took money from them, not the kick ass volunteer run donated all our extra money to charity do this cause we love it’ team.

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About Andrew Hyde

I’m a vagabond and a minimalist that sold everything but 15 things and went on a big trip (82 countries). My most read and respected blog posts are here. This blog has reached millions with writing about minimalism, startups, design, culture and events.